A month and a half ago he had ear infections. Like Wally used to, Blue gets them when there is a drastic temp drop. I know what an ear infection looks like (and smells like) and this isn't it.

One of his ears is dry. Closer to the edges of the ear he has dry skin and is flaking and sometimes scabbing.

And I had a dog who had edge of ear issues due to malnutrition and this isn't the case.

This is literally the inside of his ear flap being flaky and gross. Has anyone ever dealt with this? It's only one ear, not both, he doesn't seem to favor one ear over the other in general, though will sometimes rub the dry ear against the couch.

Ideas? Anyone? In all my years of dog ownership and working in the field I've never seen this before . . .

"All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another." -Anatole France

Sometimes we see ear infections where the ear is red and irritated and flaky and dry - it's just a different kind of infection.

If it's just on his ear flap you might be able to put lotion or vitamin E oil on it to help with the dryness. You could also try bathing him in a hydrating shampoo and make sure to saturate the ears [just not inside obviously].

Just looks dry. I work in the field, used to work at a multitude of vet's offices, and it definitely doesn't appear to be infected. Just extremely dry. I guess I'll just start moisturizing it and see what happens. Really no one else has seen this before? Damn my dogs are weird

"All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another." -Anatole France

Is it just really the edge? Like it's dry and slightly scaly and if you pick at it some hair will come with the scaly stuff? He couldn't care less for it, not rubbing/scratching?

Jack has that a little on the tips of his rather large ears. A bit of it started bleeding a couple of years ago, during winter time. Had to have it cauterized while he had a dental, but except for that it's never been an issue. Vet sait it may be from slight frostbite?, but had no idea otherwise, didn't suggest diseases or allergies or parasites of any kind. So we just let it be.

It's not on the edges of his ears. I had a dog who had scabby, scaly, crusties on the edges of her ears (Wenchy/Gertie) and it was due to malnutrition (starvation). This is definitely nothing like that. It's literally just absurdly dry skin on the inside of his ear flap, and now it's flaking off in chunks (or rather, I'm picking his scabs . . . gross). I guess I'll just keep slathering him with Eucerine and see what happens. Expecting plenty of dramatic encounters in the next week. LOL!

"All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another." -Anatole France

Oh, I've defnitely seen bacterial infection that looked like that, but generally they also had pus deeper in the ear canal, and I really doubt that's Blue's case.You can always have a cytology done to make sure nothing lives in there, but... weird.

call2arms wrote:Oh, I've defnitely seen bacterial infection that looked like that, but generally they also had pus deeper in the ear canal, and I really doubt that's Blue's case.You can always have a cytology done to make sure nothing lives in there, but... weird.

Yeah if the Eucerine doesn't make a dent in the next week I'll have the vet look at it. It's just weird it's only one ear!

"All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another." -Anatole France